Tesla engineer reportedly hired to lead Apple’s car project

By
Guillaume Rivard ,
2016-04-20

Companies are often stealing employees from rivals in order to gain an edge, and the auto industry is a good example. According to a report by the Electrek website, former Tesla Motors vice president of vehicle engineering Chris Porritt will now lead Apple’s electric car initiative, codenamed “Project Titan.”

Of course, it’s not exactly stealing when several months have passed between jobs. Tesla told the website that Porritt left in September 2015.

This comes on the heels of another report claiming that Steve Zadesky, the executive who was rumoured to be leading Project Titan, resigned from Apple earlier this year.

Porritt, who previously worked as Aston Martin chief engineer, would then become the tech giant’s most senior car expert. While his expertise covers a lot hardware engineering aspects, he is said to have a focus on vehicle dynamics, architecture and packaging.

The future appears to look brighter for the first-ever Apple car, which has yet to be made official but is expected to be released around 2019.